Politics After Television: Hindu Nationalism and the Reshaping of the Public in IndiaWinner of the 2003 Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy Book Prize In January 1987, the Indian state-run television began broadcasting a Hindu epic in serial form, the Ramayan, to nationwide audiences, violating a decades-old taboo on religious partisanship. What resulted was the largest political campaign in post-independence times, around the symbol of Lord Ram, led by Hindu nationalists. The complexion of Indian politics was irrevocably changed thereafter. In this book, Arvind Rajagopal analyses this extraordinary series of events. While audiences may have thought they were harking back to an epic golden age, Hindu nationalist leaders were embracing the prospects of neoliberalism and globalisation. Television was the device that hinged these movements together, symbolising the new possibilities of politics, at once more inclusive and authoritarian. Simultaneously, this study examines how the larger historical context was woven into and changed the character of Hindu nationalism. |
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Contents
Hindu nationalism and the cultural forms of Indian politics | 30 |
In the throes of economic crisis liberalizationHinduization | 35 |
Passive revolution and the unraveling of a fragile consensus | 43 |
The Hindu nationalist combine | 51 |
The noncommitted voter and the retailing of Hindu identity | 63 |
Prime time religion | 72 |
State sponsorship in the commerce of images | 75 |
Situating contemporary uses of an epic tradition | 86 |
The Ram Janmabhumi campaign as a managed event | 187 |
Languagedivided print media as a strategic resource | 208 |
Organization performance and symbol | 212 |
Performing the movement | 216 |
Yoking symbols and propaganda | 224 |
Hindutva goes global | 237 |
The figure of the NRI | 239 |
crafting identity across diversity | 244 |
ancient science benign oppression and a protomodern state | 99 |
Old symbols in a new language of politics | 117 |
The communicating thing and its public | 121 |
Television and the restructuring of popular and domestic space | 123 |
Television and the transformation of the context of politics | 135 |
The effects of going public | 147 |
A split public in the making and unmaking of the Ram Janmabhumi movement | 151 |
government language and politics | 156 |
the BJPs print media strategy | 171 |
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Politics After Television: Hindu Nationalism and the Reshaping of the Public ... Arvind Rajagopal No preview available - 2001 |
Common terms and phrases
appeared argued argument attempt audience authority Ayodhya became become broadcast campaign capital caste chapter character claims classes Congress context Court critical cultural Delhi discussion distinct economic effect Emergency English language existing experience Express fact forces given groups Hindi Hindu nationalism Hindu nationalists Hindutva historical identity important India instance institutions interests interview issue kind language leaders liberalization majority matter means mobilization mosque movement Muslim newspapers offered organization party percent period political popular practices presented Press question Ram Janmabhumi Ramayan refers relations relatively religion religious Report represented respect response ruling sangh secular sense serial social society sphere story Studies suggest symbols television temple things tion tradition understanding University viewers
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Page 8 - The theory of strictly economic practices is a particular case of a general theory of the economy of practices. Even when they give every appearance of disinterestedness because they escape the logic of "economic...